


Tears Cant Fall

by EchoInTheVoid



Category: Original Work
Genre: Yelling, allusions to domestic abuse, autobiographical piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 20:33:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21934846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EchoInTheVoid/pseuds/EchoInTheVoid
Summary: Looking back, all my memories, if I have them at all, are fuzzy. Sometimes I’m not even sure if they’re real memories or just my mind desperately trying to create a more pleasant picture of my horrific childhood, while wiping the rest. Somethings, however, I do remember. Lessons mostly. Important lessons. Like when I was in primary school, not sure what grade, but I was rather young, and my sister taught me not to cry.





	Tears Cant Fall

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally a school assingment

Looking back, all my memories, if I have them at all, are fuzzy. Sometimes I’m not even sure if they’re real memories or just my mind desperately trying to create a more pleasant picture of my horrific childhood, while wiping the rest. Somethings, however, I do remember. Lessons mostly. Important lessons. Like when I was in primary school, not sure what grade, but I was rather young, and my sister taught me not to cry. 

Like a dream where you are simply an observer, I see a dark kitchen with dirty, white lino, and dark beige cupboards that are practically shaking from the screaming occurring in another room. The words are indecipherable, but the rage is like a physical presence pressuring the occupants. The young children, no older than nine, are hiding and confused. 

The older child, however, doesn’t have the bliss of ignorance and denial only works after the fact, not during. She tries to keep the house together and the young ones safe. It’s the adults who are screaming, one surfacing from the haze of medication and stress, the other orchestrating it all like a sadistic horror movie director. 

During a lull, one of the small bodies takes the chance to flee the room, tears streaming down her face, barely visible behind her curtain of messy, dirty blonde hair, a physical representation of the storm currently battering the family. The young girl hides, quickly curling up in the corner, back against the cupboards, crying and hiccupping, chest burning and heaving uncontrollably, trying desperately to obtain oxygen.

Intellectually, I know that was me, but looking back, I don’t think we’d be recognisable to each other. I look at that small, frightened yet blissfully ignorant child and can’t fathom how that could be me. I imagine she would be similarly confused if she were to look at me. While I have always been shy, she at least tried to make friends, her childish innocence unspoiled by the harsh reality of life. 

A figure, taller but still young, also enters the kitchen. The figure spies the smaller one curled up and softly calls her name. Flinching, the smaller girl lifts her head, looking imploringly at her sister through her tear-soaked fringe, as if asking her to stop the battle going on outside that room. Her sister shakes her head softly, the red locks of her fringe falling into her face as she crouches down to eye level, her red hair glowing in the dim light coming in through the window above the sink, shrouding the younger girl in shadows. Calmly she coaches the girl.

‘Deep breath in, deep breath out.’

‘I can’t,’ the blonde child cries, as her chest burns, preventing her from breathing deeply, ‘it hurts.’

‘Ignore the pain.’

‘Deep breath in, deep breath out,’ the girl with red locks repeats, b reathing along with her, feeling the burn for every inhalation until slowly the burning stops, the hiccups lessen and eventually the tears dry up. 

I have no clue how long it took, but eventually  I uncurled from my ball, the screaming stopped and  I fell asleep before she carried me to my room. What happened next, I have no  recollection. Except that lesson. Ignore the pain. Don’t cry. Don’t feel. That lesson stays with me till this day. At the time, I didn’t realise the significance, and when I first did, I was thankful. Later I realised that I barely felt emotions, and couldn’t cry unless terrified, then I hated it. 

Now, however, I understand. As a child who grew up with  her  as a mother, my sister was teaching me how to survive. How to stay strong. How not to appear weak. Because true or not, that is how crying was perceived. How emotions were used. Although that method may have negative side effects in a normal, happy world, my sister taught me how to survive the world we shared. Where tears or any show of emotion would be used against you. Where ‘I love you’ was a weapon to be wielded without care. When the people who are supposed to care aren’t there, or are the ones hurting you. When you can’t run. You can’t hide. You have to endure. You have to survive. You play along. You ignore the bad shit and hope to God something good might happen. It might end. It might get better. 

So, while I may never cry for joy, and I feel numb without music or fiction most of the time. 

At least I survived long enough to feel anything at all. 


End file.
